Major E. S. Osborn, on duty in the Bureau of Military Justice, has just returned from a tour through the South where he has been collecting evidence against certain officials of the late rebel Government, who are charged with cruelty to our prisoners while confined at Andersonville and other places in the South. The commandant of the Andersonville prison, Captain Wirz, has been arrested and lodged in the Old Capitol. He is shortly to be put upon his trial for the cruelty and barbarity practiced by him upon our prisoners confined at that place. The military commission sitting in Washington, of which Brigadier-General A. B. Hunterwood is President, and Colonel N. P. Chapman, of the Ward Department, is Judge-Advocate, has been directed to try the case. The Government is now engaged in the collection of testimony, preparatory to trial.
1. Find out what happened at Andersonville.
2. How should this trial end, based on what you found?
3. Should Wirz be held personally responsible or not?
Harper's Weekly, August 12, 1865, page 499 (Domestic Intelligence)
Major E. S. Osborn, on duty in the Bureau of Military Justice, has just returned from a tour through the South where he has been collecting evidence against certain officials of the late rebel Government, who are charged with cruelty to our prisoners while confined at Andersonville and other places in the South. The commandant of the Andersonville prison, Captain Wirz, has been arrested and lodged in the Old Capitol. He is shortly to be put upon his trial for the cruelty and barbarity practiced by him upon our prisoners confined at that place. The military commission sitting in Washington, of which Brigadier-General A. B. Hunterwood is President, and Colonel N. P. Chapman, of the Ward Department, is Judge-Advocate, has been directed to try the case. The Government is now engaged in the collection of testimony, preparatory to trial.
1. Find out what happened at Andersonville.
2. How should this trial end, based on what you found?
3. Should Wirz be held personally responsible or not?